East Timor ACTION Network ALERT

Take Action for Justice & Peace for East Timor & Indonesia

Two House Letters – on Justice for East Timor and on US Assistance to
Indonesian Military

One Senate Letter – on a UN Special Representative to Indonesia

Call Your Representative and Senators Today to Sign on to All Three

Two important letters are now circulating in the House of
Representatives, along with one in the Senate. Call your Representative
and Senators today to sign on.

The Congressional switchboard number is 202-224-3121; ask for your
Senators' and Representative’s offices. Then ask to speak with the foreign
policy aide. If you don't know who your Representative or Senators are, go
to www.congress.org to find out.

For questions or to report responses, contact Karen
Orenstein, 202-544-6911 or John Miller,
718-596-7668, john@etan.org. For more information on the issues and for
the full text of the letters, visit ETAN’s website at
www.etan.org.

We are writing out of concern for the people of East Timor. As Members
of Congress who have long been interested in securing East Timor's future,
we are determined to ensure that the international community holds
responsible those who committed crimes against humanity and war crimes in
East Timor….

In early 2000, the U.N. Security Council decided to give Indonesia a
chance to conduct its own prosecutions of those responsible. As three High
Commissioners for Human Rights, the U.S. government and numerous other
observers have reported, the Indonesian Ad Hoc Human Rights Court on East
Timor was deeply flawed. This makes the continued existence of the U.N.
East Timor Serious Crimes Unit (SCU), and its continued focus on
investigations, as well as trials and appeals, essential. We urge you to
reconsider the recommendation, made in your April 29, 2004, report on the
U.N. Mission of Support in East Timor (UNMISET), that the SCU alter its
focus in the short term and end its mission entirely by May, 2005. Ending
SCU investigations at that point could leave an estimated 700 murder
victims and thousands of victims of rape, torture, and other crimes
against humanity in 1999 alone without justice

We understand that you are also considering appointing a commission of
experts to examine existing justice processes in East Timor and Indonesia
and to make recommendations for further steps. Although we believe it does
not substitute for an international tribunal, we support such a commission
and would urge it to carefully consider recommending an international
tribunal on East Timor if it finds that current processes have not
achieved justice. In doing so, we concur with similar recommendations of
the Joint Mission of Special Rapporteurs and the U.N. International
Commission of Inquiry….

The United Nations must keep its promise of justice for East Timor.
East Timor's political leaders have repeatedly urged the international
community to take the lead on this issue, and East Timorese civil society
continues to seek international support for achieving meaningful justice.
…

We were surprised and disappointed to learn that the Bilateral Defense
Dialogue between the U.S. Pacific Command and the Indonesian military
(TNI) is scheduled to reconvene. This additional step towards resumption
of normalized military to military relations without setting benchmarks
for a reform of the TNI is a cause for concern.

As you may know, a Bilateral Defense Dialogue (BDD) between Indonesia
and the U.S. has not occurred since 1997, in part because of the
tremendous TNI violence committed in East Timor in 1999. Since then, the
TNI has successfully evaded accountability for its well-documented crimes
against humanity and war crimes in East Timor, and there has been little
progress in improving human rights practices in Indonesia. Additionally,
the TNI continues it brutal tactics in Aceh, Papua, and elsewhere. There
are reports that the TNI has extensive connections to the terror group
Laskar Jihad, which has re-emerged in renewed violence in Maluku and is
operating in Papua. The TNI is also implicated in the murder of U.S.
citizens Rick Spier and Ted Burgon, in what the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta
described as "an outrageous act of terrorism."

Given the fact that so many serious human rights issues relating to the
Indonesian military remain unresolved, we respectfully ask you to
reconsider resuming the Bilateral Defense Dialogue. We believe a
resumption of the dialogue at this time would go against the strong
posture Congress and Executive Branch took in the late 1990's to severely
limit military assistance, joint exercises, and exchanges with the TNI
until human rights issues were addressed….

We request that the Department of Defense voice its concern with all
levels of leadership in the TNI about the brutal human rights record of
the Indonesian military…

We are writing to urge you to appoint a United Nations Special
Representative to Indonesia to monitor and report on the situations in
Aceh and Papua. This Special Representative would also make
recommendations regarding steps the UN Security Council and General
Assembly might undertake to end the troubling and deadly conflicts that
continue to engulf these regions.

In Aceh, the declaration of martial law on May 19, 2003, has had an
extraordinary human cost. While it is impossible to verify the precise
number of extra-judicial incarcerations and killings, accounts suggest
that more than 1300 people have been killed in the past year, the majority
of whom have been civilians. Indonesia’s National Commission on Human
Rights’ (Komnas HAM) ad-hoc team for Aceh recently reported on the
“attacks against unarmed civilians, including victims who were murdered,
tortured, sexually abused or raped, or others who the court had not yet
proved were rebels.” The report also cited kidnapping, child abuse, arson,
and robbery. The Komnas HAM team alleged that most violations were
committed by the Indonesian security forces, including both high level
political and military authorities, though some deaths have been
attributed to the rebel Free Aceh Movement. The conflict has also
generated massive refugee flows across international borders, with
thousands of others displaced internally….

In Papua, the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and the
Working Group on Arbitrary Detention have long documented human rights
violations. Recently, the Indonesian military’s creation of a militia has
exacerbated tensions between indigenous Papuans and migrants. A military
campaign in the Central Highlands has led to an inestimable number of
civilian deaths and significant population displacement. The fate of those
hiding in the Papuan forests remains unknown, as military authorities have
prohibited provision of humanitarian assistance. Human rights
organizations have endured intimidation and threats by government security
forces operating with impunity. …

The international community has remained too quiet for too long
regarding the conflicts in Aceh and Papua. The scale of human rights
violations in these two Indonesian provinces warrants special
international attention. Therefore, we urge you to appoint a Special
Representative to Indonesia to monitor and report on the situations in
Aceh and Papua. We look forward to hearing from you regarding these
concerns.